


Fucked Androids

by Skalidra



Series: Personal Relationships with Androids [2]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Elijah Kamski & Gavin Reed are Siblings, Established Relationship, Light Dom/sub, M/M, Minor Hank Anderson/Connor, Nines - Freeform, Post-Pacifist Best Ending (Detroit: Become Human), Tags May Change, Upgraded Connor | RK900 Has a Different Name
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:33:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25399957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skalidra/pseuds/Skalidra
Summary: “Good. So—”Fowler clicks on the screen behind him, little remote control in his hand as he waves it, and Gavin ceases to hear anything coming out of his mouth.‘Cause that’sElijah’sface on the screen. Professional shot; flattering and well-lit and with that smug little half-smile on his lips. His name, in the large block letters that all of Fowler’s presentations use.His stomach twists.Fuck.Fuck.
Relationships: Upgraded Connor | RK900/Gavin Reed
Series: Personal Relationships with Androids [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1839616
Comments: 30
Kudos: 171





	Fucked Androids

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! Kept you waiting, didn't I? So, this is the official sequel to Fucking Androids, expanding on our two aggressive idiots and their strangely functional relationship. Once they got there, anyway. Welcome back! Enjoy!

His alarm’s too loud, like fucking always. Harsh, grating, driving into Gavin’s ears as he groans and flails an arm out in search of his phone. Who fucking knows whether the fall of his fingers mutes it, hits the snooze button, or turns it off, but the sound stops and that’s all he really cares about.

At least, all he cares about until the chest his head is pillowed on shifts slightly, the arm wrapped around his shoulders trailing fingers down his back with an almost ticklishly light touch. He exhales, letting his outstretched arm come back in underneath the blanket. Pressure, against the top of his head. A kiss, probably.

“Good morning, Gavin,” Nines says, quiet enough to not totally break the morning silence. Loud enough, though, to make it clear that the time to be awake has come, and there will be no going back to sleep.

But getting up half an hour earlier than he used to try for, to an android alarm clock that refuses to take no for an answer, comes with some excellent bonuses. He wasn’t sold on it when Nines first suggested the idea, a couple days after him spending the night on 'date' nights became a regular thing, but he tried it anyway — because _fuck_ he can’t say no to Nines when he gets that goddamn _smirk_ on his face — and okay, yeah. It’s not all bad.

Gavin grunts something that might be an attempt at echoing the morning greeting. Maybe. His brain’s not functioning yet.

Nines’ fingers trail upwards, nails scraping up through his hair, sending tiny shivers down his spine. It feels _good_ , and even better when Nines’ fingers curl to grip a handful instead of just comb through.

He gives a tiny groan as Nines pulls, slow and careful, but enough to gradually arch his neck back. It’s enough of an angle for the next kiss to land on his mouth instead of his hair. He shifts, finds that as per the usual he’s thrown one leg over Nines’ sometime in the night, which happens to put Nines’ thigh directly up against his crotch.

He’s not hard, but it feels good to rock his hips up against that thigh, giving a faint moan at the dull pleasure it wakes. He can feel Nines smile.

“Coffee should be made in a few minutes,” Nines murmurs, tone low and intimate like it’s goddamn pillow talk.

Fuck, it might as well be.

Nines presses him back and he ends up flat, watching Nines swing up over him with easy grace that doesn’t one fucking bit match how early in the morning it is. Which made him jealous, originally, but now he doesn’t give a shit. Sure, _he’s_ human and grumpy and mornings are fucking hard most days, but if his partner happens to be an instantly-awake android that’s going to make him coffee and maybe get him off before breakfast, that’s fucking _great_. Seriously, honestly, great.

Gavin takes a breath, forcing his eyes open against the lingering weight of his eyelids, as Nines settles in across his thighs. The blanket falls down around his calves, but he really doesn’t care.

Nines is goddamn beautiful. Smooth, perfect muscle, hidden under the lean compactness of his torso. Little ‘imperfect’ freckles and tiny moles dotting his pale skin; constellations someone must have drawn by hand, balancing the flawlessness just enough to make it feel a tiny bit more believable. And he’s seen all that before — fell all over himself like a fucking idiot over it, the first night they were together — but it doesn’t matter. Nines never stops being breathtakingly, unfairly gorgeous.

Even the wave of his hair, mussed from ‘sleep’ and the pass of Gavin’s fingers from the night before, is somehow perfect. Some mornings, like this one, it’s enough to make his chest ache.

He can’t say the words, because he’s no fucking good with words, but he reaches up and touches Nines’ cheek, swipes a thumb over the perfect design of his lips. The quirk of them is warm and slightly wicked all at once, like the small squeeze of thighs against his.

“Sleep well?” Nines asks, turning his head to press a kiss to his thumb, then his palm.

Gavin clears his throat, caught up in staring. His voice is still rough from sleep, vocal cords half asleep just like the part of his head that stops him doing stupid romantic things like touching Nines’ face. “Yeah, uh… pretty decent. I guess.”

Nines hums, and then deftly catches his pointer finger between his teeth, just hard enough to keep him there as lips close and— and a tongue slides around that first inch. His breath stutters in his chest. Nines, the asshole, smiles around his finger and gives it a sharp nip as he pulls back.

“Only decently? I might have to put more effort into tiring you out, if you’re not sleeping deeply enough.” Nines’ fingers scrape, lightly, up his sides. He shudders. “I’m sure there are ways to make sure that you come to bed at a reasonable hour, or simply that when you do, you’re tired enough to fall straight to sleep. What do you think, Gavin?”

It’s only a matter of a couple inches to extend his arm a little further and grab at Nines’ hair, to be able to tug him down a little. “I think I really don't care about that right now.”

“Really?” Nines stops halfway down to him, completely ignoring the continuing pulling of his hair. “Because if you did care, we could try out a method this morning.”

Gavin stops pulling and pays attention. Maybe he's still fuzzy, but he's not fuzzy enough to miss that kind of an offer. He swallows, really tries to get his brain to do anything helpful instead of still being caught in the slowest startup cycle ever. God, he wishes Nines had never described his waking up like that; now it's in his head every time he tries to get out of bed.

Nines smiles, devious in a way no one should be able to be at the crack of goddamn dawn. The repeat of his question is slow and precise. “What do you think, Gavin? How should I tire you out?”

It's the thinnest fucking pretext for morning sex, honestly, but Gavin doesn't care one bit.

"Any way you fucking want," he breathes, and pushes up on his other hand to get in range of Nines' mouth.

Nines gives a pleased, slightly mechanical sounding hum, and slides both hands around his back to pull him higher. His core definitely appreciates being able to trust his weight to those hands instead of having to stay tensed to keep him up, and it lets him hook his other arm over Nines’ shoulder and palm the sharp curve of one shoulder blade where it stands out. Marvel of goddamn modern engineering; Nines has _shoulderblades_. Clavicles. Goddamn Achilles tendons. Form over function, has to be. No way is having shoulder blades actually a necessary and efficient thing.

Nines ruins the whole moment just a few seconds later, murmuring, “That’s not a helpful suggestion,” just after he has to pull back to get a deeper breath.

Gavin groans, dropping his head to one solid shoulder and abandoning Nines’ hair to let both arms just flop down across his back. “ _Nines_ , don’t make me think this early.” It’s not a whine. Absolutely not.

“Well, I live in eternal hope that someday you will have a functioning brain sometime in advance of five minutes before work begins. A futile hope, perhaps.” Nines’ fingers trace down his spine, then back up. He shivers when Nines' voice drops an octave, to something rich and teasing. “I suppose that leaves the choice of activity up to me.”

Yeah, given what Nines has come up with in the past he is one-hundred percent absolutely fucking fine with that. No problems. Not a one.

Nines straightens up to picture-perfect posture between one breath and the next, and then suddenly _shoves_ him back hard enough he hits the bed with a _whumpf_. It doesn't actually hurt, but it's a little startling, and he grunts more out of surprise than from the impact. He blinks, looking up at Nines and the cool, regal curl of a truly fucking devious smirk.

"Hands above your head, Detective."

He's just sleepy and just aroused enough to not complain. Nines purrs approval when his wrists cross somewhere over his head, and sweeps his gaze downwards from that over Gavin's face and chest. Hands come to his ribs, scraping nails up over them with just enough force to avoid being ticklish, not _quite_ leaving marks behind. They drag down over his stomach, where Gavin sucks in a breath and squirms. Nines smiles. Not an evil smile, or a smile that promises that he's going to do something that Gavin's not going to appreciate (immediately, the bastard), but a warm one, pleased with his reaction.

It's the kind of smile that makes his hardened, frozen fucking heart melt to little pieces. Which _Christ_ , is so fucking sappy he doesn't even want to think about saying it out loud. When the hell did he become a sap?

(He knows when. It was when the lethal, sarcastic, asshole of a robot had smiled at him and murmured, _"Good morning, Detective."_ It was waking up sore and bruised after a night of fun, and having coffee and painkillers waiting on the nightstand. It was realizing, suddenly and intensely enough it scared him, that he was _happy_.)

"You ever going to get around to actually doing something?" he baits, to cover up the moment.

Nines lifts an eyebrow, and lets the wandering fingers still just at the edge of the black briefs he wore to bed. "Well, I was planning on going to take a shower, given that you left the choice of activity up to me, but—"

“ _Nines_ ,” he absolutely doesn’t whine.

His asshole of a partner smirks. “Now, now. You know how to ask for things you want, don’t you?”

He glares, but there’s no real fight. Nines will _absolutely_ leave him high and dry if he doesn’t play along, and he’s a little too hard and not enough stubborn right now to risk that. He wants his _sex_ , damn it.

“ _Please_ ,” Gavin concedes, even though he makes it as obnoxiously whiny as he can. “ _Please_ , Nines.”

Nines’ eyes flick upwards in the smallest of rolls, but he apparently decides that’s good enough. It is all completely, utterly worth it when he slides down and ducks his head, peeling Gavin’s briefs off him with perfectly white teeth and the very edge of fingernails. It’s all uphill from there.

He forgets himself at one point, reaches down and ends up with both wrists pinned to the bed at his hips, one long thumb stretched out on each side holding them down too so he can’t thrust, or do anything but take what Nines feels like giving. All his bitching aside, he doesn’t think he wants it any other way. The fight’s nice, but this is better. (Now that he knows he’s with someone he can trust with it. That’s… new. Very new.)

Because his partner is a stupid perfectionist android with no chill, he gets exactly one minute of afterglow before the coffee machine starts beeping from the other room. Then it's up, off to the kitchen and his shitty little table where Nines drops him in a chair with no heed for his grumbling. Coffee, cereal. Something comes out of his mouth that’s probably a ‘thank you,’ and Nines pats him on the head and cooks bacon too like the manipulative, good-behavior-rewarding ass that he is.

They get more than a little handsy in the shower, and oh yeah, this is what that extra half hour is for. Nines holding him up against the wall of his exactly-too-small shower, the hot water sluicing down his body unfairly gorgeous in ways Gavin knows his reddened skin is definitely not. They get clean, eventually.

And of course, in exactly enough time to get dressed, feed his cat, and then walk out the door when they’re supposed to. It’s like living with the personification of a time management program. (But hey, if Nines wants to keep his time managed by sex acts, that’s fine? Probably? It’s certainly _effective_ , anyway.)

It’s all completely fine, a normal, good morning in the new regular schedule of his life — still bizarre when he actually stops and thinks about it, so he tries not to — right up until they both sit down and clock in.

There’s a weird energy in the bullpen, some kind of anticipation that Gavin usually only sees pre-big drug busts, and he squints around at everyone as he goes to get a cup of coffee from the break room. Maybe it could just be him being paranoid, except Nines follows him and that’s not what his schedule-sticking bot usually does. Usually, he gets to make his coffee himself, and by the time he’s back Nines will have pulled together a list of their priorities and what their day is going to look like.

Right now, though, he’s got a giant lethal android all but stepping on his heels, doing his best impression of secret service or some bullshit.

Gavin stares out into the bullpen as he pours a cup from the pot, hunting for any hint of what's going on. Fowler's not in his office, so that's a start. Not lots of arrested, complaining people, and most of his coworkers seem to be around, so no stupid-early-morning busts happening or already happened. Nobody here that shouldn't be, unless they're in the meeting room or one of the interrogation rooms. Or a cell; he hasn't looked at those today.

None of that gives him much of a clue; so far he's coming up with Fowler getting in some kind of accident and not showing up, or some random accidental arrest of a most-wanted list or something.

He grunts to himself, taking the cup in both hands to let the heat seep in. "You know what's going on?" he aims at Nines.

"No." His partner sounds irritated about that, too. "Some new case; Connor refuses to give me any details until the briefing.”

“Dick,” he mutters, glaring across the bullpen towards the distant figures of Hank and Connor. Too close to be professional, shoulders pressed together, leaning down over something on the desk. At least he and Nines are subtle.

Nines flicks his ear. It’s relatively soft enough that he just grunts and steps away, twisting his head to rub the sting out on his shoulder.

“Be nice, Detective.”

“Why?” he grumbles. “He can’t hear me.” Well, actually… “Okay, maybe he can but I shouldn’t have to be politically correct all the time just because you guys have ridiculous spy senses. You hearing my whispers from across the whole room is, first of all, creepy, and secondly? Not my problem.”

Nines arches an eyebrow. “Perhaps I’m asking you not to because Connor is a friend of mine, and I prefer not to hear him insulted within range of my hearing.”

“Oh come on, ‘dick’ is hardly even an insult. I like dicks.” His mouth snaps shut the moment the words leave his mouth. Not fast enough to actually stop him saying the stupid thing, though, and Nines is already smirking.

“Oh, I’m aware.”

“Shut up.”

Not that his partner needs to say anything else. He just turns and walks away, and Gavin ends up glaring uselessly at his back for a few seconds before he has to follow. Well, he doesn’t ‘have’ to, but his alternative is standing awkwardly in the break room pretending he has anything useful to do. Stubborn and spiteful he might be, but he tries not to make himself look like an idiot doing it.

He’s only just sat down when Nines’ head swivels upwards with slightly creepy sharpness to stare off behind him. Gavin doesn’t have the time to ask what the hell he’s doing before Fowler’s yell, as lovely and overcompensating as always, booms out across the room.

“Briefing room! Now! All of you!”

He rolls his eyes but gets back up, taking the coffee as he trudges across the bullpen. Connor and Hank join them en route, the former irritatingly bright for the early hour, though Hank at least looks about as in need of the matching cup of coffee in his hands as Gavin feels about his. Better than he has been, though. Gavin's sure as shit not going to say it, but he's better than before Connor showed up. A lot fucking better.

(So is he. Not because of Connor, the manipulative prick, but because of Nines. He's got enough security to admit that. To himself. In his own head.)

They file into the room like a bunch of tired, grumpy sheep, minus the ramrod-straight, wide-awake few androids scattered among them. The other ones in the precinct are mostly doing middling cop work; Nines and Connor are the only detectives he knows of at all, but they were built for it. Probably just going to take some time for any others to navigate the bureaucratic hell that is androids suddenly being considered real people, and what just being able to download knowledge in your head means when it comes to job requirements and training.

Gavin's actually not real sure where he falls on that himself.

Connor and Nines were specially built for this shit, and they're damn good at it even if they can be a little clueless about human motivation, sometimes. So he thinks he's fine with things like that; androids taking jobs that they were specially built for, detectives or accountants or therapists or whatever the fuck. But an android just downloading the prerequisite handbook into its head and applying? They'll pass the physicals with flying colors, probably, so the only stumbling block would be what, the simulated scenario tests?

It's going to be a whole new set of laws, that's for sure. He doesn't know enough about all the details to really have a concrete belief, but he knows it _feels_ unfair that they could just breeze through tests and instantly get what took him years. He also knows that humans are shitty, racist bastards as a whole most of the time, and they've got a real issue with making things unnecessarily difficult for minorities. Probably should be more worried about that, and less about whether it's fair that an android might be able to learn in a week what would take a human years.

All questions way above his fucking pay grade, anyway. Eli would probably have better answers, but Eli is also a manipulative genius and a son of a bitch and Gavin's still working on re-categorizing his entire childhood with that new understanding. It's not pretty, that's for sure. He's probably never going to trust another word that his half-brother says, no matter how true it sounds.

He takes a seat at the back of the room, in the corner, so he can slouch as much as he wants in the chair. Nines takes the chair right beside him, successfully putting a roughly six-foot-two android killing machine wall between him and anyone that wants to fuck with him. Or look at him. Or talk to him. Having Nines next to him has definitely cut down on the level of bullshit small talk he has to deal with.

Hank tries to do the same, but Connor steers him towards the front of the room with a firm grip and a smile, and the indecipherable grumbling doesn't make any difference. Everyone else files in under the weight of Fowler's vaguely-pissed-off eyebrow furrow, until finally he's the only one still standing, and everybody else is more or less quiet. As quiet as a roomful of cops is ever going to be, anyway, unless you order them to be.

Then he starts with a, "Alright, listen up! We've got a high profile case that our precinct has been specifically requested to take, and we're going to need all hands on deck to get it done. You screw up and it is damn likely you will lose your job, at the least, so if any of you can’t handle that kinda pressure, you leave the room right now. You all got that?"

There are some assenting sounds. Some nods. Gavin falls into the former category with a low grunt over his cup of coffee; Nines doesn’t give any acknowledgement at all. Nobody leaves. (Like leaving now wouldn’t screw your career anyway. Not having the balls to work under pressure is just as bad as fucking up when you _are_ under pressure. Nobody likes a coward.)

“Good. So—”

Fowler clicks on the screen behind him, little remote control in his hand as he waves it, and Gavin ceases to hear anything coming out of his mouth.

‘Cause that’s _Elijah’s_ face on the screen. Professional shot; flattering and well-lit and with that smug little half-smile on his lips. His name, in the large block letters that all of Fowler’s presentations use.

His stomach twists.

Fuck. _Fuck_.

The screen goes black with a burst of static.

Gavin blinks. The captain stares uncomprehendingly at the screen, then at the computer it’s hooked up to, which abruptly dies altogether with a very final sounding whine. The room’s silent for a long moment, just enough for Gavin to take a sharp breath and pretend that he’s having a completely normal reaction to a new case, not a complete freak out.

Okay. Okay, so Eli’s getting investigated for something. That’s… That’s bad. Probably. Fuck, is it, though? Eli’s his family but he’s a bastard through and through and hell, maybe he deserves it. He sure tried to fuck up Nines, after all. Tried… Tried a lot of things that Gavin’s not sure he’s ever going to forgive, now he’s recognized them as fucked up.

Shit. Why him? Why _here?_

A glance to the side shows him Nines is weirdly rigid. Not straight and perfect like usual, but stiff, and with narrowed eyes aimed at the now dead computer. It isn’t till he then catches a frown aimed backwards from Connor, at the front of the room, that Gavin links together that Nines _probably_ just killed the computer.

Fowler presses the power button. Gets approximately a second of startup before it dies again.

“Shit,” Fowler says just loud enough Gavin hears it, glaring at the computer like it’s personally offended him. Dying right at the start of his presentation is probably grounds for that, yeah. “Alright, somebody get a tech in here to fix this, and I want everyone back in an hour. No excuses; whatever you have will wait.”

Chairs scrape against the ground as everybody gets back to their feet, filing towards the door in pretty much the same disgruntled herd they came in. Nines gets up instantly, but waits for him to drag himself up too before leading the way out of the room and back towards their desks.

So, he’s got an hour to figure out what the fuck he’s going to do. Hah, like he even needs an hour. There’s only one path that doesn’t end with him probably fired, even if he hates the very idea of it.

He needs off the case. Getting off the case either means pissing Fowler off _just_ enough to get him pulled off of it but not fired, or sucking it up and going up to that office and telling him why he can’t be part of it. Telling him that secret he’s been keeping since he was a teenager, from everyone and everything.

The only alternative is keeping his mouth shut and sabotaging this whole case when the bastard lawyers inevitably bring it up anyway, and even if he could stomach how fucked up that feels, there’s no way Nines would let him get away with it. Talk about things that would cost him his job… Hell, Nines would probably tell on him just to save him from himself, no matter how pissed Gavin was at him for doing it. Nines is actually a decent person that way. (And an asshole that way.)

No choice, then. No _real_ choice, anyway.

He fidgets at his desk instead of getting any work done, watching the door to the meeting room to wait for the tech to show up, and Fowler to go back to his office. Which he’s gotta, right? He won’t just stick around and glare at the tech till it’s done, will he?

Well, if Nines killed it to begin with, he’ll probably keep it dead until he gets what he wants, anyway. Obviously his partner has come to the same conclusion as him, just… like a thousand times faster. Computer-brain benefits.

Fowler looks intensely grumpy when he does finally stalk out of the room, just a bit after the tech scurries in. Great. Good place to start from.

“Detective…” Nines murmurs, when Gavin doesn’t get up, frowning down into the depths of his coffee cup.

“I know, I know.” It’s a little snippy, but he can’t help it. “Don’t bitch at me.”

He’s expecting something censuring, a _look_ or a sigh or something, but Nines doesn’t do any of that. He just waits.

It’s enough for him to take a breath in and force himself out of the chair. The first step’s always the worst; after that it’s just momentum, one foot in front of the other across the bullpen, Nines shadowing his steps a few feet back. It’s kinda nice, having him as backup. At least if he can’t force the words out, Nines’ll say it. At least someone’s got his back.

Fowler looks up when he shoves his way into the office, eyes narrowed. “What?”

He glances out towards the rest of the bullpen, standing behind the chairs in front of the desk because nervous energy won’t let him sit down in one. “Need to talk to you. Privately.” Nines makes a noise like he’s totally unnecessarily clearing his throat, and Gavin twists to glare for a second before he adds a reluctant, “Captain.”

Fowler squints at him, then at Nines. Then grunts and hits the keyboard command to black out the windows. “Alright, fine. Talk.”

Gavin hooks his thumbs in his pockets, biting his tongue for a second before he says, “I need to be taken off this new case.”

A blink. Fowler leans back in his chair, crosses his arms. “No. We need everybody we have to get this done, Reed. I don’t care how badly you play with others; you work this with everybody else.”

He inhales, forces the defense on his tongue back down his throat. No snapping. No yelling. He braces his hands on the back of the chair, leaning his weight into it. “It’s not about that. I can’t work this one. You know I wouldn’t ask off a high profile case for no reason, Captain.”

Fowler frowns at him. Seems to consider what he’s said for a few moments, and Gavin _almost_ hopes that’ll work before— “That’s not good enough, Reed. You want out? I need a reason.”

_Fuck_.

His hands clench on the chair. No choice. Have to remember, he’s got _no choice_.

The words feel like glass at the back of his throat, but he grits his teeth, stares at the back of the chair, and forces out, “Kamski’s my brother.”

A beat of silence. “ _What?_ ”

Damnit, the disbelief in Fowler’s voice is exactly the reason he never wanted to tell anyone. He can just _feel_ the judgment. Not a genius, not rich, not fucking anything that Eli is. Just a random detective in a shitty city with the mother of all attitude problems.

Staring at the back of the chair is infinitely easier than looking up at whatever the fuck is on Fowler’s face, that's for sure. “Half-brother. Whatever; doesn’t fucking matter. I _can’t_ work this case, okay? Just take me off it and I’ll pick up the slack from everybody else while they do it.”

The wheels on the chair scrape across the ground as Fowler gets up, and Gavin’s gaze yanks up to him without his permission. “Why the hell didn't I know this?"

"It wasn't any of your business, that's why," is sharper than it should be and he knows it the instant it comes out of his mouth.

Fowler's expression tightens into a glare, and Gavin braces himself for a fight, for yelling, but Nines takes that moment to cut in with, "Factually, an officer's private life is no business of his superior's unless it interferes with his job. Until this moment, it hasn't. He was fully within his rights to withhold the details of his personal relationships.”

Fowler’s pinched expression is kind of a glorious thing. Especially because it’s aimed at Nines, and not him.

“Also,” Nines adds, somewhat casually, “just about every trace of their relation has been wiped from all public record. I searched. So there’s no reason you should have known without being told; the erasure was very deliberately implemented, I believe.”

"Does it really matter?" Gavin gripes, resisting the urge to turn and glare at Nines. Yeah, of course he looked for proof, after all the bullshit went down with Eli. Why wouldn't he? "Just take me off the case."

Fowler scrubs a hand over his eyes, looking like he really _wants_ to sigh but has just enough restraint left not to do it. "Fine. You're off.” The hand drops to jab an aggressive finger at him. “Don't you surprise me like this again, Reed; losing one of my best detectives is going to be bad enough without any more surprises from you."

Gavin shrugs, straightening up enough to hook his thumbs in his pockets again. "Sure."

“Unfortunately,” Nines chimes in, still sounding all too casual, “I have to request that I be dismissed from this investigation as well.”

Fowler’s gaze laser-focuses. If looks could kill… “Why?”

“Because unless I’m mistaken, this investigation is based on the evidence I gave of Kamski’s assault on me.” Gavin looks back just in time to catch the way Nines glances at him. “And because I am Detective Reed’s partner. My involvement would open up too many potential legal issues to exploit, and I would imagine if it comes to trial, Kamski will have only the best lawyers. It’s safest to pull me from the case as well.”

Okay, that's something that Gavin probably should have figured out on his own, but it still catches him a little bit by surprise. Sure, Fowler looks pissed, but it's kinda nice to know that Nines isn't going to be off investigating his brother, totally unable to talk to him about it. Now they can both be out of the loop. That’s not _great_ , but it’s fucking something.

"Fine. _Fine_. Just go, both of you."

Gavin nods, turns on his heel and heads for the door. Nines falls in step just behind him.

"And send in Connor and Hank!"

Great.

He's not looking forward to playing fetch, but turns out he doesn't have to. The second they step outside, Connor straightens up with too-perfect posture from Hank's desk and turns their direction, LED a visible yellow even from where Gavin's heading down the steps. A glance back at Nines confirms the same color, so he mentally crosses off 'yell at Connor' from his list and heads towards their desk. Nines follows.

He drops into his chair, sprawling backwards and propping up his feet on the desk. He waits till Connor and Hank vanish into the still black-windowed office, and then says, "Alright, so no big case. What else have we got?"

Nines doesn't immediately answer, and when he does, it's not to say anything about that, but, "I feel I should inform you that though Captain Fowler may not say anything specific, there is a very good chance that Connor will put together the reason for our exclusion. His systems may not be quite as advanced as mine, but I believe there are enough clues to connect the dots."

Gavin grimaces. He'd like to deny it, but, "Yeah, I figured."

Another pause. Nines’ mouth opens, but Gavin beats him to it.

“It’s fine, Nines. Just… give me something to do, okay? There’s gotta be some murder or something waiting for us, right?”

He’ll just fucking ignore it, and maybe Connor will mind his own business for once and not bring it up. And, just to make sure everything goes fine, it won’t come up anywhere in the investigation, or the trial, or anything else. Nobody will ever even mention that the precinct investigating probably the most influential man in the country just happens to also have a detective that’s his half-brother. Yeah, cause _that’s_ likely.

“Indeed there is, Detective. I’ll send the relative files to your screen; we can—”

Gavin takes a breath and reaches for the previously discarded cup of coffee waiting for him, turning his attention to the screen as he listens.

It’s fine. Everything’s gonna go fine.

**Author's Note:**

> [You can find my Tumblr here!](https://skalidra.tumblr.com/)


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